Saturday, October 08, 2016

Snake orgy in bottom of empty swimming pool said to be a rare occurrence

A family in Nerang on the Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia, made a rare discovery after finding eight tree snakes having an orgy in their derelict backyard pool.
Ray and Sue Jeffrey were entertaining family on the back deck of their Nerang home which overlooks the pool when someone spotted a snake.
"I called my wife out who was in the kitchen and then she looked down there was this tangled mess of snakes," Mr Jeffrey said.

Mr Jeffrey quickly called snake catchers Samuel Howard and Katie Eales to their home.
"When we went down to the pool area, I just held the phone with a light on and the two of them bare-handed just grabbed the whole tangled mess to get as many as they could in one go and tossed them into the bag," Mr Jeffrey said.
"Then they took them back out of the bag and counted them one-by-one into another bag to make sure they had the right count."
Mr Howard said it was an unusual number of snakes to be found and a record for him.

"It just so happened that there was a few pairs of tree snakes mating and there were a few males waiting for their turn next," Mr Howard said.
He said tree snakes were one of only two species found on the Gold Coast who were happy to share females.
"It is still quite an unusual act to happen, it is not usually seen or often witnessed," Mr Howard said.
The snake catcher said the pool's cracks and shallow water provided the perfect environment for the snakes.
"The water that was sitting in the pool was inundated with little frogs and cane toads and tree snakes love eating frogs," he said.

"Because the pool was empty there was lots of cracks in the wall of the pool and tree snakes love living in little cracks.
So we think they probably all had a lovely home in there with a little water source, heaps of food and lots of little cavities they could hide in, and now it is breeding season they have all come out together and found each other."
Mr Jeffrey said he was happy to have witnessed something so rare.
"I think we were lucky in they were essentially a very harmless snake at the end of the day just doing what they do," he said. The snakes have since been transported to a more suitable location.